The walk back to the palace felt longer than it ever had before.
Each step echoed hollow against marble, stripped of purpose, stripped of command. The air was heavy, too heavy, with the silence that follows something irreversible.
At the entrance to the royal wing, Caelen stopped. His guards halted behind him, uncertain.
"That will be all," he said quietly.
The men exchanged glances, but none dared to argue. They bowed, armor clinking faintly, and withdrew into the shadows until their footsteps vanished down the hall.
Only when the last sound faded did he move again.
He turned, slowly, toward the hall that had once belonged to her.
The Fire Queen's wing.
Now nothing but ghosts.
He had avoided this place since she left their marriage bed for the last time. Even when she was alive and reigning, he'd found excuses not to come here. But now, as he crossed the threshold, it was as though the years between then and now had collapsed into one long, endless breath.
